Word: suva
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Mohammad Yasin Khan started to suspect there was a problem when the industrial park?on the edge of Suva, Fiji's capital?began to smell like a latrine. A warehouse had been set up there to manufacture plastic furniture. But Khan, who runs a hardware store on the same block, said the factory workers seemed paranoid, avoiding conversation and reinforcing the doors and windows with metal bars. And the smell from a nearby culvert was foul. "We thought maybe it was something from the shop," he says. "The smell of the drain, it was like urine...
...Solo smugglers like yachtsmen and hippie wanderers have crisscrossed the South Pacific for decades. But organized crime didn't cast much of a shadow over the region until 2000, when police in Suva seized 350 kg of heroin bound for Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Since then, the law-enforcement radar has blipped increasingly often over Fiji. In 2002, 74 kg of methamphetamine was found on a ship in Singapore headed for Fiji and Australia; in the same year, Hawaiian police busted a syndicate that smuggled cocaine and ice to the U.S. mainland, Tonga, Fiji, Australia and New Zealand...
...warehouse - in a sprawling industrial estate on the edge of Suva, Fiji's capital - had been leased by a trader from Hong Kong. The crystal methamphetamine, or ice, being "cooked" inside was destined, says Fiji Police Commissioner Andrew Hughes, for "the U.S., Australia, New Zealand and Europe." The cops who swooped on the building June 9 - finding 5 kg of the glassy drug and enough chemicals to make a metric ton of it - came from Fiji, Australia and New Zealand. Of the suspects arrested that day, one was Fijian-born, two were Chinese Fijians and four held Hong Kong passports...
Solo smugglers like yachtsmen and hippie wanderers have crisscrossed the South Pacific for decades. But organized crime didn't cast much of a shadow over the region until 2000, when police in Suva seized 350 kg of heroin bound for Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Since then, the law-enforcement radar has blipped increasingly often over Fiji. In 2002, 74 kg of methamphetamine was found on a ship in Singapore headed for Fiji and Australia; the same year Hawaiian police busted a syndicate that smuggled cocaine and ice to the U.S. mainland, Tonga, Fiji, Australia and New Zealand; and last...
...South Pacific isn't out of danger, says police chief Hughes, but "I think we have sent a strong message that Fiji is not as vulnerable as people thought." Suva businessman Tauz Khan, whose security-equipment and taxi companies are in the same industrial estate as the drug warehouse, hopes he's right. The fight against drugs must succeed, he says: "We don't want these guys to come back here and spoil our paradise...